My mom’s surgery is over with now and I am at home. Turns out, she tore out 20 stitches down to the joint and he had to go in there to restitch it all up. She now has a souvenir of the plastic upper part…not sure what it’s called…he took the old one out for safety’s sake and replaced it…..BUT not the actual knee. He said it didn’t look infected at all but he took a culture anyways and she will have to remain at the hospital until it comes back. IF it comes back as a contamination, they may be able to just keep her on antibiotics and watch it, but worst case scenario, they would have to take everything out…..and she would have to wait 6 weeks for a new knee replacement. 😦 Crossing my fingers that everything goes well so she doesn’t have to go through that. The doctor put a brace on her knee and said he may keep it there for a month…I think he really wants to make sure the stitches stay in this time!

She was in a lot of pain after surgery….on a scale of 1 to 10, she said 10…..which she did NOT say the first time and this is the same woman who was at 90% bend on day 2 after knee replacement surgery and rated her pain THEN at a 3 or 4! If she is rating it a 10, it has to be bad…..I don’t know if anyone else understands this, but I KNOW my mom! She was still extremely groggy hours after surgery and barely half awake….when I kinda woke her to say bye, she was STILL complaining of pain even though they had given her a shot of demerol an hour before. Needless to say, I left the hospital room and started tearing up in the hallway. My husband asked me what was wrong and I wouldn’t tell him until we got to the car…where I started bawling. I hate seeing my mom in pain and I hate leaving her there by herself while she’s going through it….I feel like I am this horrible daugher for leaving her there alone cause I know she would be there every minute by my side if I was in there in pain.

Right now, I have not slept in over 24 hours and all I can think about is my mom waking up and not seeing anyone she loves by her side and it breaks my heart….: (

I know she told me to go on home but I feel bad….

Please continue to keep her in your prayers!

UPDATE: After being in pain all night and them only giving her pills that were having NO effect at all, my dad called and talked to her doctor and it was decided to give her a nerve block in her knee. After her first knee surgery, they had done this but not THIS time. She was given the nerve block around 11 this morning and she is now doing a lot better. Thank God for that! I hated knowing she was in so much pain! Now to await the culture to make sure everything is OK!

I hope your mom gets better every day. Pain management is a tough issue, but you really have to complain if you hurt because there are meds available to help. Many doctors hesitate to use them, so it’s worth complaining! Hopefully your mom gets to keep this knee and doesn’t have to go for more surgery.

She thinks it was because they told her she had such a high pain tolerance last time, they might have thought she didn’t need them. But she said she definitely DID! I’m just glad her knee is not bothering her much anymore. The antibiotics are bothering her tummy a bit though but nothing like the pain of her knee, so Thank God for that! Thanks for the prayers!

“He couldn’t see why people made such a fuss about people eating their silly old fruit anyway, but life would be a lot less fun if they didn’t. And there was never an apple, in Adam’s opinion, that wasn’t worth the trouble you got into for eating it.” ~from Good Omens